NYC to put QR codes on building permits

Although QR codes have been used for a few years in other countries, in the U.S. we're still learning how to put them to work for us. In New York, Mayor Michael Bloomberg is taking them to the streets and buildings of his city. Soon, QR codes will be on all Department of Buildings permits.

New Yorkers expect to be able to gather information instantly, and the use of QR codes will allow them to get all information about construction work while standing on the sidewalk,” said Mayor Bloomberg. “The QR codes will provide more efficient access to government data, help the public know what’s being built in their neighborhoods, and it will allow people to make more informed decisions about things from renting an apartment to making a complaint. This is another example of how we are using the latest advances in technology to increase accountability and provide more information to the public.

After scanning the codes Mayor Bloomberg is putting in place, New Yorkers will have access to the building permit history of whomever is attached to the permit. Pretty cool to see such a use case for QR codes being put to work. [Mike Bloomberg]

Great news for Samsung Captivate owners! The Android 2.2 upgrade is coming tomorrow! We’ll post a link here to the Samsung site with instructions to install the upgrade tomorrow.

The official update comes on the heals of that leaked KB1 update, which we showed you mere hours ago. And chances are it'll be the same as what gets pushed out. Stay tuned this week for complete install instructions.

Forget an Oscar award, Motorola is giving out golden Xooms

Every year, Hollywood gathers for The Academy Awards to celebrate movies and the talent that comes with them. Actors and actresses walk across the red carpet with big smiles and designer clothing. But this year will be a little different. Hollywood's talent will be given something else to show off at the Academy Awards. Motorola will be giving out gold Motorola Xooms to the hosts and the nominees in the Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress and Best Director categories. The snazzy Xoom will also come with a custom leather case, too.

As for the rest of us, we can just pick up the regular all-black Xoom this Thursday. [Engadget]

New Android 3.0 Honeycomb wallpapers

Want to add a drop of Honeycomb to your phone, desktop or tablet? You can now find nine new wallpapers from the latest Android 3.0 SDK build over on the Android Central forums. The images are all at least 1920x1280 resolution, so there's plenty of pixels to go around. Eight of the images are brand new, while one is a higher-quality version of one of the wallpapers from the earlier SDK preview.

A few have been seen over the past couple of months on Honeycomb tablets like the Motorola Xoom and Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, while some haven't been shown in public before. Head on over to the Android Central forums now to get your hands on this latest cache of pretty pictures.

Motorola Atrix 4G gets customary teardown treatment

With the release of the Motorola Atrix 4G comes the customary teardown from the folks over at iFixit. While teardowns may not appeal to everyone, they often times reveal some unexpected details about the gadgets we love. Look at some of the finer details found within the Motorola Atrix 4G:

The LCD is not glued to the front panel glass. Should you ever need to replace the glass, it not being glued makes this easier.

No VOID stickers to be found on the Atrix making it repair-friendly

Toshiba 16GB NAND Flash, 1GB DDR2 RAM, NVIDIA Tegra 2 CPU

Qualcomm MDM6200 supporting HSPA+ up to 14.4 Mbps

Most of what was outlined could be found in the specs but should you ever need repair guide or just want a deeper look into the components used to build the Atrix this teardown should serve well. Further details an be found over at the source link. [iFixit]

While we're still waiting for an official Froyo build to be released for the AT&T Samsung Captivate there is now a few leaked ROM's floating around. If you all remember when UCJI6 leaked back in October 2010, it required some ODIN hackery to get it up and running. A new leak has now popped up -- I897UCKB1 is available for anyone on the adventurous side just remember, experimental builds can cause some chaos so be proceed with caution. File in question can be found at the source link, and you'll need ODIN again to get it going. [XDA] Thanks, Conan!

Post EB13 bugs on the Epic, Inspire 4G battery life [From the forums]

Who got a Motorola Atrix 4G today or yesterday? It's always awesome getting a new device. The joy of taking that baby out of the box, unwrapping it and powering it up for the first time. If you managed to pick up Motorola Atrix -- or any other device for that matter, let us know in the forums. People are always looking to others for opinions on devices and the forums are a great place to share yours with them.

Android 2.3.3 OTA now rolling out to Nexus S and Nexus One (finally!)

Good news for long-suffering Nexus One owners - Android 2.3.3 Gingerbread has finally begun rolling out for the original Nexus and its big brother, the Nexus S over-the-air. For the Nexus S, 2.3.3 will introduce new near-field communication (NFC) capabilities. For those still rocking a Nexus One, this will be the first official taste of Gingerbread on the device.

The news was broken via the official Google Nexus Twitter account, which advises users to be patient, and says that the OTA update process will take several weeks. Of course, direct links to the OTA update package should start to emerge long before then for anyone feeling a little impatient. [GoogleNexus on Twitter] More in the Nexus One Forums!

Minecraft coming to Android devices

Game developer Mojang recently revealed that Minecraft, its insanely popular sandbox building game, will be coming to mobile devices running Android and iOS. Mojang's Danial Kaplan said that the developer had considered delegating the mobile version of Minecraft to a third-party developer but ultimately decided to keep things in-house.

Despite technically still being in beta, Minecraft was one of the most popular indie games of 2010 selling its millionth copy in early January of this year. Mojang aims to launch Minecraft on Android later this year. [Kotaku]

Android Honeycomb 3.0 SDK add-on finalized and available

Google has released the full Honeycomb 3.0 SDK updates, meaning developers can download and begin work with the finalized APIs for Honeycomb. This comes in preparation for the launch of the Motorola Xoom on Feb. 24 and will let developers check what they've built using the 3.0 SDK preview against the final version before the Honeycomb tablets start to roll out. If you're an app developer, or just like to keep your SDK current, you can update things through the SDK manager.

It's worth noting that the AOSP source (as well as Motorola's open-source portions) should be released before the Xoom is launched, so be on the lookout for that come Thursday morning if you're a DIY kind of person. [Android Developers blog]

Motorola Xoom to have unlockable bootloader for developers

Motorola just confirmed via Twitter that the Xoom will have an unlockable bootloader to aid developers in app development. Here it is, in no uncertain terms:

"The XOOM will have an unlockable/relockable bootloader that will enable developers to access hardware for development."

As the first Android Honeycomb tablet, it is vital for the Android platform that devs have as much access to the device as possible, so this is darn good news. [Twitter via Android Central Forums] Thanks to everyone who sent this in!

T-Mobile's Galaxy S 4G pricing, coming Feb. 23

This is a reminder that the Samsung Galaxy S 4G will be available starting Feb. 23 -- as in tomorrow -- and we have a clarification on pricing. Previous reports of the phone costing $149.99 on a two-year agreement were inaccurate, and the phone will cost $199.99 on contract with a $50 mail in rebate.

We had a little hands-on time with this one in Spain, and at first look it's everything a T-Mobile Vibrant user could wish for. We have one here in the Android Central offices, and we will be giving it a little closer look soon. In the meantime, you can always hit the Android Central Galaxy S 4G forums and see what others are thinking about this one.

The LG Optimus S Control Center makes things easy [From the forums]

If you're rocking an LG Optimus S on Sprint, you MUST check out the LG Optimus S Control Center from Android Central Forums member drewwalton19216801. Behind the long name is an easy-to-use Windows application that does a little bit of everything you need to hack your Optimus S, without fiddling with the prompt or trying to remember cryptic commands.

Using what the developer has dubbed "Android Automation Technology" (AAT) the current version will root your phone, unroot your phone, and install your choice of recovery kernels. There's also the magic of "No Stupid Stuff" -- which prevents the application from doing things it shouldn't -- like trying to swap recovery kernels without being rooted or trying to unroot when you shouldn't.

This looks like an awesome beginning for a tool that will do it all. Some of the features planned for a future release are things like removing/restoring Sprint ID, Switching launchers, and possibly even switching ROMs and kernels. Very nice work Drew, you've made a great little phone even better. Go check it out in the Android Central forums!

Google I/O tickets listed at alarming prices in eBay auctions

We've got nothing against capitalism and making a quick buck here and there, but there's something just ... wrong about tickets to the Google I/O developer's conference being auctioned off for more than $1,300.

Sure, the event sold out in just 59 minutes, and there's going to be more browser, search and Android news than can be contained in 48 hours -- plus the parties, food and strong possibility of free stuff. But considering the general-admission price of a ticket was $$450/550 and are now going for more than double that -- and student/teacher tickets are going for a good $400 or so over face value -- well, it just leaves a bad taste in our mouths for what is an exceptional event that not enough people get to attend.

The good news is that Google will stream the keynote addresses live both days, and session videos will go up later, so it's not like you completely miss out if you're not there. In the meantime, however, let's hope that Google or eBay or (gasp) the sellers do the right thing here. [eBay via Android Police]

Sony 'S2' clamshell tablet reportedly in development

As well as the 9.4-inch "S1" tablet that Sony is rumored to be working on, the electronics giant is also developing a 5.5-inch clamshell device dubbed the "S2", according to reports from Engadget.

The dual-screen S2 would deliver the same Qriocity-focused experience as the S1, powered by a Tegra 2 chipset and a customized version of Android 3.0 Honeycomb. The blog's sources describe a similar dual-screen setup to that of the Kyocera Echo, with the Gmail app apparently showing a list of messages on one screen and the body of the selected message on the other. While this all sounds pretty innovative, Engadget's sources are sceptical about how successful the device will be, with one of them reportedly calling it a "dog".

Apparently Sony's plan is to launch the S2 before the end of the year for around $699, a considerable bump from $599 price point supposedly being considered for the S1. [Engadget]

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